Led by their reluctant point guard, the Kentucky Wildcats shocked Gonzaga in OT thriller
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Game day: No. 4 Kentucky 90, No. 7 Gonzaga 89 (OT)
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Saturday night’s men’s basketball game between Kentucky and Gonzaga in Seattle.
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Mark Pope couldn’t wait to tell the story.
Just minutes after his Kentucky Wildcats unleashed a furious comeback to recover from an 18-point deficit and defeat the No. 7-ranked Gonzaga Bulldogs 90-89 in overtime, the UK head coach sat at a table in Climate Pledge Arena.
Two stars of the improbable victory — Jaxson Robinson and Andrew Carr — sat on either side of him. Pope knew a question would be coming about Robinson’s performance. And when it did, he beamed.
“I love this story so much,” Pope said, looking over at Robinson. “Can I tell it?”
“I guess,” his veteran guard mumbled, a smile on his face and a here-we-go-again tone in his voice.
Pope set up his story by reminding those assembled that — these days in college basketball — guys like him don’t get to coach players very long that often. In this particular case, Robinson is the only Wildcat that Pope had coached before this season. The pair spent two years at BYU together, and both have talked in the past about how far Robinson has come in that time, putting his trust in Pope and watching his game grow as a result.
“I’m insanely blessed to get to coach Jax for a third year,” Pope said. “And watching players grow is like the best thing ever. It’s just the best thing ever. It’s the best thing about basketball.”
And then it was time for the story that he couldn’t wait to tell.
Pope reflected back to BYU’s game at Oklahoma in February — an 82-66 loss, the Cougars’ most lopsided defeat of the season — and explained that Robinson (a 6-foot-6 guard more accustomed to hunting shots) was having to play a lot of point guard for the team that night.
By his account, it wasn’t going well.
After one particularly bad play, Robinson was running back down the court in transition defense, and — without breaking stride — he turned his attention briefly toward his coach on the sideline.
“And he turned and yelled — in transition defense — ‘I am never playing point guard again!’” Pope recalled with sheer glee. “And my guy — a year later — is a five-assist, zero-turnover (player). Played the point for the last eight minutes of the game — under massive duress — and the full overtime. And I’m telling you, he’s special, man.”
Pope went on to praise Robinson’s recent defensive efforts. “Breathtaking,” he said. The coach lauded his player’s toughness in recent games. “Incredible,” Pope called it. And then he got in one more playful dig at the player on this team that he knows best.
“Actually, the first thing he did was go straight to the training room to try and get Lamont (Butler) and Kerr (Kriisa) healthy. We’ll see how that works out. But until that happens, we’re really blessed to have Jaxson Robinson.”
On this night in Seattle — Climate Pledge Arena packed out with Gonzaga fans, a few vocal pockets of Big Blue Nation scattered here and there — the Cats wouldn’t have won without him.
Already clear underdogs on the road against one of the best teams in the country, No. 4 Kentucky suffered a blow before the game began, Pope deciding after the team’s shootaround that Butler wouldn’t be able to play, the ankle injury he suffered in Tuesday’s loss at Clemson still lingering.
Things started well enough. Kriisa — a backup to Butler this season but a starter of 93 games at the high-major level before becoming a Wildcat — canned a 3-pointer on Kentucky’s first possession, scoring his 1,000th college point in the process. Next trip down, Robinson hit a 3-pointer of his own. Six points in less than a minute. Maybe this would work out after all.
But from there, the game went off the rails.
With Butler out, the Cats had no answer for Gonzaga point guard Ryan Nembhard, the NCAA’s assists leader. And UK had no answer period for Zags big man Graham Ike, who helped lead his team to an 89-85 win over the Cats in Rupp Arena last season and looked poised for an even bigger performance with a much bigger margin of victory Saturday night.
By halftime, Nembhard had seven assists. Ike had 18 points and eight rebounds. The Bulldogs led the Wildcats by 16, and it appeared that Kentucky was cooked.
The clock had ticked past 11 p.m. in Lexington before the players were back on the court in Seattle to start the second half. Almost certainly, some Cats fans back home called it a night.
“People that went to sleep at halftime will be so sad,” Pope said with a smile.
Gonzaga extended its lead to 18 points with the first bucket of the second half. The two teams traded a couple of baskets each, and then the Cats pounced. A layup from Otega Oweh ignited a 13-0 flurry for Kentucky, which cut Gonzaga’s lead to 56-52 with nearly 15 minutes left to play. It was game on from there.
After that, Gonzaga never led by more than two possessions again. But Kentucky couldn’t get the lead at all. Every time it would come close to evening the score, the Zags would answer.
The Cats kept switching up their defenses during that second-half run. They also found ways to limit the two players who had abused them so thoroughly in the first half. Ike didn’t score his first point of the second half until just 6:06 remained in regulation. Nembhard didn’t dish out his first assist of the second half until 25 seconds after that.
Pope didn’t accept the defensive switch as any kind of coaching masterstroke.
“It’s easy to make that decision when you’re getting cooked,” he quipped. “... Sometimes you’re sitting there in the huddle and you’re like, ‘Well, why not try it? Because right now what we’re doing is not working.’ And we’re really blessed to have veteran guys where we can change up a lot. …
“It can be kind of confusing, and you can’t do that with a young team. But we’ve got these vet guys that are super-high IQ, and so you can mess around with them. These guys did an unbelievable job.”
Along the way, the Wildcats became even more shorthanded. With Butler already out, Kriisa stepped awkwardly trying to get back in transition defense and fell to the floor after Gonzaga scored to take a 65-59 lead with 8:41 left. He never returned to the game. Robinson entered in his place, and he didn’t sub out for the rest of the night.
Robinson hit two free throws to cut Gonzaga’s lead to one with 2:19 left. The Zags answered. Robinson hit a jumper to cut it to one with 1:31 left. But then Ike hit a free throw to make it 79-77. And then Carr delivered, hitting a turnaround jumper from just inside the elbow to tie it at 79 with 1:01 left. The Cats actually got the last look in regulation, but Koby Brea’s jumper didn’t go down just before the buzzer. Extra basketball would be needed to settle this one.
Kentucky landed the first punch, Robinson unleashing a cross-court pass to Oweh, who caught it in the corner and drove the baseline for a dunk to give the Cats their first lead since they had an 8-7 advantage with 17 minutes left in the first half.
Robinson then grabbed a defensive rebound, took one dribble and threw a pass the length of the court, where Amari Williams received it underneath the basket and scored to put Kentucky up 83-79.
“It was risky,” Robinson acknowledged after the win, looking over at his coach with a smile.
Pope and Carr laughed in agreement. And then Carr chimed in. “Trust,” he said.
“Trust, baby,” Pope echoed with a nod.
Kentucky ended up scoring the first seven points of overtime. Gonzaga narrowed it back to one on two separate occasions, but the Zags never led again. Carr missed two free throws with 4.3 seconds left, but then he stripped the ball from Dusty Stromer at the end, the buzzer sounding without Gonzaga getting off a final shot.
Carr led the Wildcats with 19 points. Robinson was next with 18 points, dribbling around for 16 seconds off an inbounds play before hitting a runner to give UK a 90-86 lead, ultimately the deciding basket in an epic comeback. But just as important on this night were the plays he made down the stretch for others. He had five assists for the first time in nearly two years.
“It starts with my teammates and my coaches. I can’t give them enough credit,” Robinson said. “They instill confidence in me every day, regardless if the shot’s going in or not. They know that I can affect the game in many more ways than just shooting the ball.”
Four nights after the first loss of the Pope era — the 70-66 defeat at Clemson — this one looked headed for disaster. Instead, the Kentucky coach, once again, had reason to hope for an even brighter future.
Pope, who had a 1-9 record against Mark Few and Gonzaga before Saturday night, led his Cats to a come-from-behind victory over then-No. 6 Duke last month. He praised his team’s resolve after that one. Pope also said earlier in the week that he was more confident in his Cats after the Clemson loss than before — noting the way they faced adversity and fixed things at halftime, even if they didn’t get the result they wanted in the end.
The 16-point halftime deficit that was overcome Saturday night tied a school record. To pull off such a feat against a legitimate Final Four contender, led by one of the best coaches in the game, and with UK playing minus both of its point guards? More reasons for Pope to smile.
Kentucky’s coach talked about the gains made in practice in the two days before this game. He spoke with pride about his guys overcoming yet another halftime deficit by dialing in their focus and homing in on the type of game they wanted to play.
“I was massively encouraged today by us learning how we can punish — just seeing some of the fruit of these guys’ work the last couple days — about learning how you can punish teams that really push out on you. It was actually terrific. It was really good. And you have a little bit of success like that, the guys are going to see it and they’re going to believe a little bit more, right? And it makes them a little more dangerous. And so that’s really encouraging.”
This story was originally published December 8, 2024 at 3:06 AM.
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